Among The Living
by TheTeaDrinker
Summary: Cassie Richmon is floating through her life. Steve Rogers is struggling to maintain a normal one. Its hard to fall in love when there's so many problems that develop. Drama, tensions, world-wide terrorists organisations, and alien invasions. Captain America/OC. Steve Rogers/OC


After a long day after an even longer adventure (who knew walking downtown with Clint would end in such disaster and terrorism?) Steve noticed the little café at the end of his street.

Well, sure he had _noticed _it before. The serum had enhances pretty much all of his qualities, senses included. But before the café had just been a little spec in the distance, a tiny shop just at the end of the street from his apartment.

Suddenly the urge to drink coffee and sit on uncomfortable chairs in a place where the waitresses were rude and the food hot-but-not-too-hot came over Steve and he started making his way over.

_JJ's, _the painted words proudly displayed above the window-walls that showed off the inside of the restaurant. Steve could already tell that not many people were in there, seeing as it was a bit late, and for that he was grateful. Truthfully, he had a bit of a five o'clock shadow and the dark clothes and hair flopped down from the sprinkles of rain probably disguised him pretty well, but he still wasn't exactly in the mood to talk about being resurrected with anyone.

The door jingled a bit as he walked inside, yet no one looked up. There was an old man sitting in the corner slurping some sort of soup, a woman cradling a baby as she read a thick book and a teenager struggling not to fall asleep as he was writing some sort of paper at his table. Steve assumed that he could just seat himself down, so he did just that, taking a spot in the corner opposite the old man.

Surprisingly, the booth was not uncomfortable, but plushy and soft, like something you'd find in a five-star French restaurant, but more worn…more comforting.

A middle-aged woman with curly brown hair that was struggling to be pulled back approached him with a note pad and a pen.

"Can I get you something?" She asked, an expectant look on her face. A moment of confusion struck Steve. He had never gotten a menu…then he realized she was asking for what he wanted to drink.

"Just coffee for now, ma'am," he answered and she nodded.

"There's your menu if you're craving some food, be back quickly with your coffee." She turned, knocking loose a few more curls, and headed back behind her counter.

It was then when he actually spotted _her_ for the first time.

She came from the kitchen so quietly he wouldn't have noticed her if he hadn't already been looking in that direction.

She had a large rectangular bucket that was propped on her hip as she moved through the café and made her way quickly and quietly to a table near the front that still had dishes on it. As she picked up the dishes and carefully put them in the bucket, Steve noticed a few flecks of glitter in her messy bun on the back of her head that caught the light. She moved her head slowly as she moved the dishes, cautious not to disrupt the large headphones that enveloped her ears and the top of her head like a headband.

It wasn't like she was a particularly exotic goddess trapped in a busboy's (bus woman's?) body. She just seemed like a woman trying to get through her day and go home while successfully ignoring everyone in the vicinity.

When the waitress came back, Steve declined the offer of food and sipped his coffee, and for some reason he couldn't get that girl out of his head.

Steve wasn't thinking about her in a romantic, longing way (at least not yet), it was more curiosity than anything. He found her intriguing, if that was the right word, and he had the urge to know her.

He brushed off the feeling though. It was just natural curiosity that strangers who see other strangers get. The girl looked interesting, as strangers often do, and he wanted to know her. It was casual, it was nothing.

But still he waited for her to come back out when the mother left with her child, the old man left, the teenage boy left.

She came for their tables, and quickly, quietly put their dishes in the bucket, avoiding eye contact with any of the remaining costumers, the waitress, and the chef behind the counter that would make glances at her.

Steve didn't think she was being rude, simply that she either didn't know anyone was looking at her, or she was uncomfortable with the contact, so she avoided it.

He was actually so deep in thought as to why she did it that he didn't notice a tiny hand with black glitter nail polish reaching for his coffee cup.

Steve gasped a tiny bit in surprise and even jumped a bit, which only added to the fact that he was _stunned. _She snuck up on him. Without meaning to, trying, or even attempting to be quiet she had snuck up on him without making a single sound at all and he _hadn't noticed her._

But she noticed him.

Eyes opened in shock because of his reaction, her hand retracted and moved towards her chest, like a slow reaction to being burned. Her mouth opened slowly, and she seemed to think about what she said, like one would to a wounded and potentially dangerous animal.

"I'm…sorry. We're closing…soon, and I thought you were done." She paused once more and seemed to consider something. "Did you want a refill?"

Still in a bit of shock over this girl, Steve shook his head.

"No, I'm sorry. I didn't notice you. I'm done, thank you."

Her lips started moving towards what might have been a polite smile, but then she seemed to reconsider and just nodded instead. She picked up the cup, carefully moved it into the bucket, and headed back to the kitchen.

Around a moment after that, the waitress returned with an unimpressed look and an upturned eyebrow.

"What?" He asked, a bit defensive.

She sighed and rolled her eyes. "Two dollars for the coffee." She settled on.

Giving her a weird look for her behavior, Steve fished two one's out of his wallet and handed them over to the waitress, who sighed once more, then turned around to walk back to the register.

Halfway there, she paused, seemed to consider something and the turned back around to Steve, who was just getting out of the booth to leave the café, since it was near closing time.

A determined look on her face, she walked briskly back to the super soldier and pointed to him, keeping her voice low.

"Look, if you want to talk to Cassie you can catch her about twenty minutes after we close up."

"…Cassie?" Steve asked, whose face resembled that of a confused puppy.

The waitress rolled her eyes again, and sighed, like she was constantly surrounded by people too idiotic to keep up with her genius.

"Pretty brunette girl with the big ass headphones and picked up your coffee cup? Ring any bells?" She gestured around herself to help jog his memory.

"Oh! I wasn't…I mean I didn't-"

She cut him off with a wave, "Please. I caught you making googley eyes at her when she came by. If you want to talk to her she leaves about twenty minutes after we close up. Offer to walk her home or something." She winked at him, then turned around with purpose and strode back into the kitchen, the door swinging noisily behind her.

Steve was left a little bit astounded and confused. He wasn't aware he had been making "googley eyes" at Cassie (apparently that was her name), and he wasn't exactly sure what "googley eyes" were. He could make a pretty well-rounded guess, but it still didn't make much sense.

In a cloud of confusion, he walked out of the café and leaned against the large marble pillar next to it. He stayed there for a few moments, and glanced back into the café (which had just closed) a couple times before he realized what he was doing.

What was he doing? Was he actually waiting for this girl? He knew nothing about her. Sure, she was very beautiful, but he exchanged roughly two sentences with her, and they had probably just been part of the fact that she was just doing her job. How would he even try to initiate contact with her? "Hello, I saw your face and liked it. Can I walk you home? Pinky swear I won't murder you."

It wasn't like he could break out the whole "I'm Captain America" thing either. It was pretentious. It was kinda rude. It sounded like she should go out with him simply because he was Captain America, like she owed it to him or something. That was just wrong. And weird.

A few minutes later, he finally decided that he shouldn't even bother. Most likely, she just wanted to get home, and probably had to shoo away idiots who wanted to ask her out all the time. If he told her that his waitress told him her name, she might get even more creeped out.

Mentally beating himself up for not being brave enough (or at least not brave enough tonight of all night), he put his hood back up to block the rain, and headed back down the street to his apartment. Thankfully there weren't many cars on this street at this time of night.

If he had turned back, he would have seen the dark haired girl whose name we recently learned was Cassie step out of the restaurant and place her chunky purple headphones back on her head and look out to the street.

As she noticed the handsome man who had coffee walking down the street (she would have noticed those shoulders anywhere) she watched as he jogged down the street and over into a building.

The night was a little misty from the rain, but clear enough that Cassie could still see the shape his butt through his sweatpants. Taking a few moments to watch as he jogged, she allowed a small smirk to fall in place as she admired it. Then she headed towards her bus stop, smirk glued on and staying.

* * *

><p><strong>I<strong>**'ve had this story saved for a super long time, and I figured I'd publish it and then maybe when I get some time I'll actually start continuing. Considering I've got like three other stories I should be working on, publishing another one is pretty dumb, but oh well. I hope you liked it!**


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